MSNBC's Bagdadblog: "These results are still unofficial - coming from State Department figures and not from the Independent Electoral Commission in Iraq (IECI) - but the headline is that it was a good day in terms of voter turnout, not only in Fallujah, but throughout al Anbar province.

Preliminary figures have 21,000 people voting in Ramadi, 19,000 in Hit/Haditha, and 42,000 in the far west – where the cities of Qaim and Rutbah are located.

That would be over 80,000 votes, not including around 200,000 in the greater Fallujah area.

By comparison, about 14,000 voted through out the province in January of this year."

Roger L. Simon: Mystery Novelist and Screenwriter

Roger L. Simon: Mystery Novelist and Screenwriter: "BIG LOSERS of the day so far: Howard Dean, Jack Murtha, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the rest of the reactionary, fuddy-duddy leadership of the Democratic Party. (To call them 'liberals' is absurd because they have no ideology whatsoever.) How will they spin this? Of course the second big loser is the Mainstream Media - again without ideology, really."

W. Thomas Smith Jr. on Iraq on National Review Online

W. Thomas Smith Jr. on Iraq on National Review Online: "As Iraqis queue up at polling stations, some of the scenes look more like a series of regional block parties than what most Westerners would associate with an election day. Children can be seen waving flags or playing soccer. Adults are cheering, clapping hands, beating drums, singing, dancing, and waving at passing U.S. and Iraqi military vehicles. There simply seems to have been more energy in the run-up to this election than in previous ones. And why not?"

Sens. Joseph Biden, D-Del.; Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.; and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., accompanied US Iraqi Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad to the city of Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad."

Hammorabi

Hammorabi: "In few hours time Iraq will be the Model in Democracy and freedom for the Middle East and the Arab region.

Iraq will lead the changes.

Finally the totalitarian and the one dogma dominated region will end.

God make people free and no one should impose his thoughts to control the others."ThreatsWatch.Org: InBrief: Voting in Barwana

ThreatsWatch.Org: InBrief: Voting in Barwana: "Barwana, once part of Zarqawi self declared “Islamic Republic of Iraq”, is now the scene of al-Qaeda’s greatest nightmare: Muslims exercising their constitutional right to chose their destiny."

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comments:

Which Middle Eastern domino will be the next to fall? Iraq is merely the first step. Radical Islamism cannot be defeated until democracy becomes the norm in that area of the world. Muslims must embrace modernity. Allowing them to continue embracing the mindset of the Middle Ages is too dangerous for the rest of us.

Just noticed, that page also has a link to an INCREDIBLE Moore like interview with the "great" professor Erwin Chemerinsky:(Never did regard that guy as highly as Hugh. Hewitt was SPEECHLESS.)Erwin Chemerinsky will deny success in Iraq three times.12-14smartguys.mp3

"And I know it is very premature, but I wonder; in 15 years, will Iraq or France be the closer ally?"

Dec. 20, 2020 - Paris, Iraq

President Jenna Bush met today with Prime Minister Tamara Chalabi in the capital city of Iraq's northernmost province to discuss the proposed merger of WATO (West Asian Treaty Organization) with the remaining members of the NATO alliance.

As a charter member of both organizations, US agreement to said merger was anticipated to be a matter of formality rather than serious negotiation. It is interesting to note that both leaders fathers had worked together early in the century during Operation Iraqi Freedom - the foundation of democracy in the middle east. The cession of France to Iraq by the United Nations as reparation for French perfidy during the runup to OIF was mandated by a Security Council Resolution of 2015 which was followed by a French plebescite relinquishing France to Iraq in 2016.

Credit for the astonishing 85% victory margin in the plebescite has been assigned to campaign manager Karl Rove whose "Be a winner - for once" slogan caught fire among the then French.

Meanwhile, Chuck Dugold, leading the remaining Free French garrison on St. Pierre and Miquelon, once again refused to recognize the merger unless Prime Minister Steyn of the UK, reneged on his decision to end British contributions to the North Atlantic Islands Commonwealth of old Europa (NAICE).

This Guy, that had a silly comment at Roger's made post below....I would appreciate if the local experienced legal expert did a post on the basics of what we can do and not do under fair use.Thanks.---PJM - Rut Roh!This from PJM on the front page.: In the blogosphere, In The Bullpen has photos from news services, ...At the height of the Holloway coverage I had a warning form a guy at AP about reposting a photo. I'm not sure about what licenses PJM has purchased, but I'm not sure it's a good idea for a formal company to post the link and citation they have. Not to mention their own disclaimers about re-purposing their content. Hmm.

Oh, by the way, thanks for all the nice words, folks, but Buddy did the illo and Rick took my umpteen posts --- I was all excited and just hitting "Blog This" left and right --- and turned them into one post. About all I contributed creatively was putting "Iraq Won" in Courier.

This journalist watched a Zarkawi decap video on his computer, and up and joined the Marines. Damn!

"We often talk about how our policies are radicalizing young men in the Middle East to become our enemies, but rarely do we talk about how their actions are radicalizing us. In a brief moment of revulsion, sitting there in that living room, I became their blowback."

Thanks in advance, Julian.---Buddy,When GWB talked about the honors student we lost that had everything going for him when he informed his dad that he wanted to do something more meaningful like join the Marines, I had a similar, if more tearful reaction....then his dad did something heroic in his loving tribute.Forgot the specifics, but not the gravity.

TIME Magazine has just fired the sales staff. Word is, the shake up will be a turn around so radical they're gonna spell 'time' backwards, call it EMIT Magazine, with the new slogan "We emit we were wrong about the war".

Let me 'shplain it fer ya. Like last month, when a couple of the French recruits knocked on my cubicle while I was filling out the Q3 casualty spreadsheet. "Um, Monsieur Zarqawi, we would like to request a transfer to the Paris office."

Okay, so I'm like looking over at Khalid, trying not to laugh. "mmm, okayyyy, any particular reason?"

"Well, sir, since we are French, and France is hot right now, um, and we know the territory and all, we just, like, thought our jihad org skill development would be, well better in the, uh...Paris..."

Shit, I though I was gonna spray some Mecca-Cola through my nose when I saw Khalid behind them, doing that throat-slash thingy with his hook, but I kept it together. "Sure! Sounds like a plan, guys! Umm, why don't you go with Khalid. He'll take you out back and have you fill out the transfer forms." Long story short, they're back in Paris. Torsos, at least.

In fairness I guess you expect that kind of pussified goatshit from French recruits, even when they're shahids. Weasels or not, at least they have enough sense to try to save their own asses. But man, then there are these crazy fucking Saudi and Yemeni and Syrian assholes. Those guys are so stupid and horny for Paradise poontang that they're already blowing themselves up before they get their luggage unloaded from the courtesy van. We got a little joke here at the office:

"What's the last thing a Saudi says to a Syrian before they met Allah? "What does this button do?""

I'm telling you, If you were around these felchers 10 minutes you'd be convinced we need to rethink this whole marrying-in-the-clan thing. And, along with the stupid, comes the gullibility. Zawahiri, in all his motivational wisdom, bought a Dish Network subscription for the office so we could get the CNN and MSNBC feeds. "Good for morale," or something like that.

Okay, I know I'm beginning to sound like a depressed broken record here, but consider this: the elections are still on, and even that worthless fat fuck al-Sadr has put down the halwa and waddled over to join the infidel democracy bullshit. I'm starting to get paranoid about my job security because OBL stopped returning my emails a month ago. Yeah, I've heard the rumor that he's dead, but either way it looks like I'll be lucky if the bonus this year is "Zarkman lives to see the Texas-USC game."

No Joke .BRATTLEBORO, Vt. - A lesbian couple who entered into the nation's first same-sex civil union are splitting up amid allegations of violent behavior. Carolyn Conrad, 35, asked a court in October to end her relationship with Kathleen Peterson, 46.

Conrad also obtained a restraining order Wednesday against her partner, saying Peterson punched a hole in the wall during an argument and threatened to harm a friend.

"All I want to say is that the civil union was a big source of pride for me, and now it's not," Peterson said.

Conrad also obtained a restraining order Wednesday against her partner, saying Peterson punched a hole in the wall during an argument and threatened to harm a friend.

I don't know that this really proves anything except bad choices. Lesbian abuse is not a new thing, there was a lesbian couple who lived up the airshaft in the building in NYC where I once shared an apartment. They had big fights and the lipstick lesbian of the pair would sometimes show up sporting a shiner.

Peter, that's OLD News.Today's news is that Bush is a closet KGB type looking into our bedrooms.Good enough reason to give Terrorists their Rights, Trash the Patriot Act, and oh yeah, put all your "news" about yesterday behind us, where it belongs, in the dustbin of history....along w/all those bodies.

Oh well, anonymous, at least you are showing yourself what you really think about democracy. In fact, Iraq and the rest of the world is much better off with these elections, even if Shiite theocrats get elected. Because it is step one to establishing the norm of free and open elections. And if there remains enough will in Americs to insist that this norm be re-inforced, that there will be future elections, then in time the self-correcting principles of democracy will soften all edges.

BUt it takes faith in humanity to believe in such a thing. Better than giving up and saying just let the tyrants rule, don't you think? Or how do you get out of bed in the morning?

Anonymous, if your "point" was about unintended consequenes and irony it was well hidden. But then you are probably one of those pomo chaps/esses who can't express himherself without subtle irony, as if your method of thinking and speaking were a truth in itself. But as the CHinese Daoists already learned millennia ago, the way that can be spoken of is not the true or eternal way.

Which is no excuse not to have faith, quite the opposite. So you're glad but you'll hold off singing praises? What a life! Little if any faith! If everyone thinks like this, I'll guarantee you that things will turn bad in the next few months and we'll have nothing to sing about.